Treasury Removes Jackson From $20 Bill, Will Replace Him With Harriet Tubman

Presenting an artist's impression of what your new $20 bill will soon look like.

It's official.

Moments ago Politico reported that the U.S. Treasury will announce that it plans to replace former President Andrew Jackson on the $20 bill with Harriet Tubman, the sources said. There will also be changes to the $5 bill to depict civil rights era leaders including Marian Anderson, Eleanor Roosevelt and Martin Luther King Jr.

Not every dead president is being scraped however: treasury Secretary Jack Lew on Wednesday will announce a decision to keep Alexander Hamilton on the front of the $10 bill and put leaders of the movement to give women the right to vote on the back of the bill.

Lew's decision comes after he announced last summer that he was considering replacing Hamilton on the $10 bill with a woman. The announcement drew swift rebukes from fans of Hamilton, who helped create the Treasury Department and the modern American financial system. Critics immediately suggested Hamilton take Jackson off the $20 bill given the former president's role in moving native Americans off their land.

Jackson may remain on the $20 bill in some capacity, but will clearly be demoted.

Lew told POLITICO last July that Treasury was exploring ways to respond to critics. “There are a number of options of how we can resolve this,” Lew said. “We’re not taking Alexander Hamilton off our currency.”

Treasury Secretary Lew Announces Front of New $20 to Feature Harriet Tubman, Lays Out Plans for New $20, $10 and $5

4/20/2016 ?

WASHINGTON – In a letter to the American people, Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew today announced plans for the new $20, $10 and $5 notes, with the portrait of Harriet Tubman to be featured on the front of the new $20.

Secretary Lew also announced plans for the reverse of the new $10 to feature an image of the historic march for suffrage that ended on the steps of the Treasury Department and honor the leaders of the suffrage movement—Lucretia Mott, Sojourner Truth, Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Alice Paul. The front of the new $10 note will maintain the portrait of Alexander Hamilton.

Finally, he announced plans for the reverse of the new $5 to honor events at the Lincoln Memorial that helped to shape our history and our democracy and prominent individuals involved in those events, including Marian Anderson, Eleanor Roosevelt and Martin Luther King Jr.

The reverse of the new $20 will feature images of the White House and President Andrew Jackson.

In his letter, Secretary Lew noted that the Bureau of Engraving and Printing will work closely with the Federal Reserve to accelerate work on the new $20 and $5 notes, with the goal that all three new notes go into circulation as quickly as possible, consistent with security requirements.

Here is Jacob Lew's "explanatory" letter:

An Open Letter from Secretary Lew:

When I announced last June that a newly redesigned $10 note would feature a woman, I hoped to encourage a national conversation about women in our democracy. The response has been powerful. You and your fellow citizens from across the country have made your voices heard through town hall discussions and roundtable conversations, and with more than a million responses via mail and email, and through handwritten notes, tweets, and social media posts. Thank you for sharing this thoughtful and impassioned feedback.

Over the course of the last 10 months, you put forth hundreds of names of people who have played a pivotal role in our nation’s history. Many of you proposed that our new currency highlight democracy in action and reflect the diversity of our great nation. Some of you suggested we skip the redesign of the $10 note, which is the next in line for a security upgrade, and move immediately to redesigning the $20 note. And others proposed unconventional ideas, such as creating a $25 bill.

I have been inspired by this conversation and today I am excited to announce that for the first time in more than a century, the front of our currency will feature the portrait of a woman—Harriet Tubman on the $20 note.

Since we began this process, we have heard overwhelming encouragement from Americans to look at notes beyond the $10. Based on this input, I have directed the Bureau of Engraving and Printing to accelerate plans for the redesign of the $20, $10, and $5 notes. We already have begun work on initial concepts for each note, which will continue this year. We anticipate that final concept designs for the new $20, $10, and $5 notes will all be unveiled in 2020 in conjunction with the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment, which granted women the right to vote.

The decision to put Harriet Tubman on the new $20 was driven by thousands of responses we received from Americans young and old. I have been particularly struck by the many comments and reactions from children for whom Harriet Tubman is not just a historical figure, but a role model for leadership and participation in our democracy. You shared your thoughts about her life and her works and how they changed our nation and represented our most cherished values. Looking back on her life, Tubman once said, “I would fight for liberty so long as my strength lasted.” And she did fight, for the freedom of slaves and for the right of women to vote. Her incredible story of courage and commitment to equality embodies the ideals of democracy that our nation celebrates, and we will continue to value her legacy by honoring her on our currency. The reverse of the new $20 will continue to feature the White House as well as an image of President Andrew Jackson.

As I said when we launched this exciting project: after more than 100 years, we cannot delay, so the next bill to be redesigned must include women, who for too long have been absent from our currency. The new $10 will honor the story and the heroes of the women’s suffrage movement against the backdrop of the Treasury building. Treasury’s relationship with the suffrage movement dates back to the March of 1913, when advocates came together on the steps of the Treasury building to demonstrate for a woman’s right to vote, seven years prior to the passage of the 19th Amendment. The new $10 design will depict that historic march and honor Lucretia Mott, Sojourner Truth, Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Alice Paul for their contributions to the suffrage movement. The front of the new $10 will continue to feature Alexander Hamilton, our nation’s first Treasury Secretary and the architect of our economic system.

The reverse of the new $5 will depict the historic events that have occurred at the Lincoln Memorial. In 1939, at a time when Washington’s concert halls were still segregated, world-renowned Opera singer Marian Anderson helped advance civil rights when, with the support of First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, she performed at the Lincoln Memorial in front of 75,000 people. And in 1963, Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his historic “I Have a Dream” speech at the same monument in front of hundreds of thousands. Honoring these figures will bring to life events at the Lincoln Memorial that helped to shape our history and our democracy. The front of the new $5 will continue to feature President Lincoln.

Due to security needs, the redesigned $10 note is scheduled to go into circulation next. I have directed the Bureau of Engraving and Printing to work closely with the Federal Reserve to accelerate work on the new $20 and $5 notes. Our goal is to have all three new notes go into circulation as quickly as possible, while ensuring that we protect against counterfeiting through effective and sophisticated production.

This process has been much bigger than one square inch on one bill, and along the way, we heard about countless individuals who contributed to our democracy. Our website, modernmoney.treasury.gov, will highlight many of the names that we heard throughout this process, and help tell some of the many stories that inspired us. Of course, more work remains to tell the rich and textured history of our country. But with this decision, our currency will now tell more of our story and reflect the contributions of women as well as men to our great democracy.

Thank you,

Secretary Jacob J. Lew

* * *

Confused? Disturbed? Angry? You are not alone. The following rant by Mac Slavo expressed many feeling about the proposed change.

The latest battle is for the face of the currency itself, and the central bankers, who control the front anyway, have imposed a symbolic defeat against the leaders in America’s past who have fought against the stranglehold of the money makers.

Naturally, there are liberal politics at play, fighting for every inch of ground in the war for ideological re-engineering. History is being whitewashed, various figures of antiquity rolling in their graves….

At stake is a dispute for the powers of government even better than the more famous duel between Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton, of whom we also speak.

The iconic $20 bill, with the face of President Andrew Jackson, and the $10 bill, with the face of the nation’s first Treasury Secretary, Alexander Hamilton, have long pitted two ideological extremes against each other as they pass along as some of the most used denominations in circulation.

But now, the money powers at the Treasury Department have decided that it is time to add a woman’s face to the money supply as well.

As such, the powers-that-bank have decided to oust Andrew Jackson from the line up, and with it, part of his legacy.

It will be “removed in favor of a female representing the struggle for racial equality,” according to CNN, while an early proposal to remove Alexander Hamilton’s bill will be scrapped, though the proposal includes a redesign on the backs of his and several other notes with scenes from the Woman’s Suffrage Movement, Susan B. and all the gals.

Treasury Secretary Jack Lew is expected to announce this week that Alexander Hamilton’s face will remain on the front of the $10 bill and a woman will replace Andrew Jackson on the face of the $20 bill, a senior government source told CNN on Saturday.

Dramatically, it seems that there was a backlash to counter the coup against Hamilton, including support from former Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke:

The decision to make the historic change at the expense of Hamilton drew angry rebukes from fans of the former Treasury Secretary. The pro-Hamilton movement gained steam after the smash success of the hip-hop Broadway musical about his life this year.

Those pressures led Lew to determine that Hamilton should remain on the front of the bill.

Hamilton was a compulsive statist who wanted to bring the corrupt British mercantilist system — the very system the American Revolution was fought to escape from — to America. He fought fiercely for his program of corporate welfare, protectionist tariffs, public debt, pervasive taxation, and a central bank run by politicians and their appointees out of the nation’s capital….

Hamilton complained to George Washington that “we need a government of more energy” and expressed disgust over “an excessive concern for liberty in public men”…

Alexander Hamilton, the first Secretary of the Treasury, urged Congress to also assume the war debts of the individual states and then create a national bank to help refinance all these debts. Hamilton’s proposal faced major opposition. Critics said that Hamilton’s bank was unconstitutional, would be a monopoly, and would reduce the power of the states. Although Hamilton won, the bank’s charter was limited to 20 years.

And that’s right where Andrew Jackson’s legacy with the banks picks up.

With the charter of the first “Bank of the United States” ending, Jackson was determined to stop the charter of the second “Bank of the United States” and famously stated:

“You are a den of vipers and thieves. I intend to rout you out, and by the eternal God, I will rout you out.” (Andrew Jackson, to a delegation of bankers discussing the recharter of the Second Bank of the United States, 1832)

President Jackson likened their agents to the hydra-beast, with its many heads, and even survived an assassination attempt, by staving off an attacker personally.

The bankers, and the powerful families including the Rothschilds who supported it, wanted a “national bank” because they could load the board with “their” guys and outweigh the will of the people and the normal channels of government.

Of course, the same exact state of affairs has been going on today for more than a century with the Federal Reserve, which is run by the successors to the same exact banking interests, including the still immensely-powerful Rothschild family.

The struggle is depicted well in “The Money Masters,” which spans several centuries of history with the threat of banking powers over individual sovereignty in stark contrast. To be sure, there is an important and nefarious plot afoot to ensnare you, your family and everyone on the block with debt.

Jackson narrowly succeeded in staving off banker domination of the U.S. during his day.

Of course, Andrew Jackson, who was the United States’ seventh president, was also a complete controversy his entire lifetime. It is no surprise that the same people who took down the Confederate flag from the South on the back of a mass shooting tragedy are now trying to tear down the image of a particularly controversial and intriguing figure from the American past.

Jackson was a recalcitrant and unyielding general and war hero, and later an outsider riding a wave of populist support into the White House, bringing in sometimes unscrupulous companions, and plenty of Masons. Many of his backers were diametrically opposed to the entrenched power of New York bankers and speculators, as well as patrician politicians who dominated the first phase of politics in the nation’s history. Jackson played a nasty role in the Trail of Tears affairs with Indians, too, and with the South and Western expansion of slave-friendly territories. Many shades of grey.

Meanwhile, behind the scenes in the founding days of this country, Alexander Hamilton, an advocate of strong central government, and maneuvered on behalf of his banker masters to collectivize the war debt from the states and create a central bank to control the financial strength of the country, and ingrain the early United States with the mindset of the British masters they had just fought to shake off.

After the creation of the Federal Reserve in 1913, and the crisis and consolidation of wealth during the Great Depression, and ever since the 2008 economic collapse, the rule by bankers has become a foregone conclusion, though there will be more chances to shake off their yoke of control. (BitCoin is one possible avenue; Congressionally-controlled greenbacks another; gold and silver yet another…)

Erasing Andrew Jackson from the faces of the fiat funny-money that is passed around by an increasingly ignorant and dependent society (which itself has adopted digital currency as the new norm) will further cut off the past from the masses, and ensure their enslavement.